Railroad line quiet for 17 years starts regular freight service Friday along Highway 2 corridor

LINCOLN, Neb. (KLKN) – You might have heard the warning piercing through the December air in the overnight hours, or even actually saw the signs at various intersections around Lincoln, but starting January 1, 2021, there will be a freight train running along the Highway 2 Railroad Corridor about twice a day.

The reality? Those train tracks many of you drive over throughout south Lincoln and Lancaster County are going to come back to life twice a day at various times starting January 1. That’s about 6 days a week. The trains will run 25-30 miles an hour and will be about 140 cars long, about 1.5 miles. 300 trains per year on average.

This is part of a Burlington Northern Sante Fe (BNSF Railway) and Omaha Public Power District deal to make BNSF the utility’s coal transportation provider. BNSF will take a load of coal to Nebraska City and Omaha once a day, then that train will come back to Lincoln.

Some drivers might not even realize the number of railroad tracks they cross in a given day or week. With a rail line that hasn’t been regularly used since 2003, the noise of trains and stopping of traffic doesn’t happen, so you get used to just passing over them without thinking about it.

That’s all about to change, and it’s about to change in a part of Lincoln that has experienced tremendous growth in the 17 years since that rail line was active. This corridor isn’t a designated “quiet zone” and it won’t even be considered until the next meeting in March the Railroad Transportation Safety District decided in a December 7 meeting.

Here’s a map showing all of the crossings in Lancaster county that will now have a train running through starting Friday, January 1.

A public service message has been going out with the message is “See Tracks? Think Train.” There are signs near the crossings telling drivers the same thing.

“We really want to make sure that folks in the Lincoln area and Nebraska City know that trains are going to be coming back through there,” Courtney Wallace, a Spokesperson for BNSF Railway said. “And to just be safe around the railroad, always expect a train going in either direction.”

We’ll have continuing coverage of this story throughout the week and into the new year.